


Peppermint

by sailoreyes67



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Christmas, Coffee Shops, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Future-fic, Holidays, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-21
Updated: 2012-11-21
Packaged: 2017-11-19 04:54:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,791
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/569332
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sailoreyes67/pseuds/sailoreyes67
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sam and Cas go into a coffeeshop to escape the weather and it turns out to be the best decision they ever made.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Peppermint

Night has fallen, the sky is doing something halfway between raining and snowing, and Sam and Cas take refuge in a coffee shop, Sam pushing the heavy door open with the back of his cold-reddened fist only after Castiel has demanded he do so in the commanding angel-of-the-lord voice he’s barely used ever since he took away Sam’s pain, inflicted on him in the first place by a fallen angel. (Sometimes, when he looks at Cas, he can see the broken grace. Sometimes, when he looks at Cas, all he can see is Lucifer.)  
  
The thick warmth that comes when he steps into the coffeeshop (bell jangling richly behind him) is such a change that Sam doesn’t move for a moment, and Cas looks at him in open concern. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah.” Sam says. “I’m fine, Cas.”

He jerks forward and catches a sudden sneeze between two chapped red fingers. “ _heh’_ gsh _’uh!”_

Cas raises his eyebrows at him. Actually, he’s probably trying to raise _one_ , a gesture he picked up from Dean and hasn’t quite mastered, but the effect of disbelief and unnecessary levels of worry is remarkably similar. Except Cas actually looks near tears about it.

“Hey,” Sam begins, sniffling a little. But Cas is already brightening, eyes tracking the menu written on a large old-fashioned blackboard.

“Look, Sam! They have hot chocolate!” he exclaims.

Sam smiles. “Is that what you want?”

Cas nods forcefully. He looks almost like a little kid, despite his soaked trenchcoat.

(Sometimes, when he looks at Cas, he doesn’t know _what_ he sees.)

The coffeeshop isn’t brightly lit, not dark enough to be considered in shadow, but close. There are multicolored Christmas lights strung merrily across the counter, windows, and around the walls, and Neil Diamond‘s version of “Winter Wonderland” is playing. Sam guesses it is close to Christmas, although he never noticed it coming. Cas is taking his arm and tugging him towards the order counter, and Sam realizes he was spacing out. He pinches his nose to fight off a second sneeze and follows.

“What can I get you?” the smiling woman behind the counter asks. She’s older than most coffee shop employees, although still sort of young, and Sam is struck by the idea that she looks like Jess would if she were still alive. He shakes his head to clear it.

“Hot chocolate.” Cas answers promptly. “Large.”

“Okay.” she responds. “Now would you like our holiday special, peppermint hot chocolate? It’s hot chocolate with peppermint in it and it comes with whipped cream and mints on top.”

“Um...” Cas turns towards Sam, shooting him a look of confusion and maybe a little bit of terror. He still isn’t good at making decision in the human world, and the slightest unexpected turn can still throw him completely off balance. He’s better with demons.

Sam can relate to that.

“Just the regular.” he decides. Peppermint hot chocolate doesn’t sound very good, and Cas was so excited about hot chocolate, Sam doesn’t want him to be disappointed if he doesn’t like it.

“No, wait!” Cas says. He grabs Sam’s arm again, looking at him with an intense, though unreadable, expression on his face. “I decided. I want peppermint.”

“Are you sure?” Sam murmers in Cas’ ear, and Cas nods.

“Okay.” the barista says. She looks a little amused as she punches it into the small receipt machine in front of her. “Anything else?”

“Just a coffee.” Sam says quickly. He’s feeling a little off-balance himself, although he can’t figure out why. “Black.”

“Alright!” :)

Sam and Cas go sit down at a table by a window, and then Cas, apparently restless, paces back around to get their drinks. He comes back carrying a tall cup of whipped cream (well, it looks like that) and two straws in the same hand.

Sam turns away from the window, where he’s been looking out at the street, zoning out to the repetitive pattern of the cars. It’s snowing in earnest, and windshield wipers aren’t enough to keep all the blank whiteness away.

“Where’s mine?”

“I left it behind.” Cas replies, his tone grave.

“What? _Why?_ ”

“Because plain coffee does not taste good. It is merely fuel, I believe, and you are not in need of fuel. You are in need of warmth. Therefore...” he sits down next to the hunter, placing his warm hand on top of Sam’s cold one and rubs, rather absently, over the chapped red fingers. It feels so good that Sam shudders a little. Cas leans towards him, so that their faces are almost touching, and a part of Sam wants to flinch away from the invisible blinding light of Castiel’s grace, but another, equal part wants to lean closer and kiss him. They’ve kissed before, actually, but it’s always awkward, always like neither of them quite understands or knows what they want, and Castiel always insists on keeping his eyes open, “so I can see you, Sam.” while Sam gazes vaguely at whatever is behind Castiel’s head. It’s a matter of lips and teeth mashing against each other, nothing else, and last time Sam promised himself he wasn’t going to do it again. He thought, once, that they could have this, but he was clearly wrong. So he doesn’t kiss the angel, just waits for him to finish speaking.

Castiel seems to have lost his bearings, his expression unreadable again, but after a moment he visibly pulls himself together and continues, tightening his grip on Sam’s hand. “Therefore you will drink hot chocolate with me.”

He says it gently, but it’s a command.

“Cas, you can’t---” Sam tries anyway.

“Hush.” Castiel says, and Sam does.

Cas unwraps the first straw, going slowly and carefully, intent on his task, like it matters if the paper wrapping is torn imperfectly, and Sam watches. He’s still seething, a little, or maybe just thrown, because Castiel isn’t supposed to be bossing him around, angel or not, dammit. But then Cas looks at him with such a hopeful, near pleading, expression, that Sam melts. He takes the straw that Castiel offers him, not even bothering to question the real need for straws, and takes a sip.

It’s surprisingly good. He’s not sure why he was so sure it wouldn’t be, just that peppermint and chocolate and heat shouldn’t go together as well as they do.

“Do you like it?” Cas asks. His tone is almost frightened, like if Sam says no a whole other apocalypse will start again.

“Yes.” Sam says. He smiles.

Cas lets out a sigh. “Can I drink with you?” he asks, still seeming tentative.

“Go ahead.” Sam smiles at the different use of the overly familiar term. “It’s your hot chocolate.”

Cas looks really relieved, this time, and he smiles. “Thank you Sam.”

Sam manages not to roll his eyes.

Cas scoots closer, half off his chair, in order to reach the cup, and his knees bump against Sam’s thighs. He leans over, right up against Sam’s space, and with extreme care places the second, much more hastily unwrapped, straw in the hot chocolate. Then he slurps.

He’s adorable, Sam thinks. His trenchcoat is mostly dry now, but there are still wet patches on the shoulders, and his short shair is tousled with wind and water. He’s completely fixated on the hot chocolate, eyes wide and full of wonder.

Sam leans down and attaches his mouth to the other straw again. They’re so close that their foreheads touch and Sam’s nose brushes against Castiel’s cheek.

(Sometimes, he looks at Cas and all he sees is a miracle.)

***

Castiel can’t believe how good the peppermint hot chocolate tastes. He’d wanted it, because it was a tiny thing of Christmas, and he’d suddenly realized that letting Christmas go unacknowledged was the closest to blasphemy he’d ever come. That is, not counting deciding to take God’s place, or to break Sam’s Wall, or the million other sins he’d committed that would never wash clean. Even when Sam looks at him, sometimes, he sees a trace of fear in those beautiful brown eyes. It makes his gut twist and his heart heavy, he never, _ever_ wanted Sam to be afraid of him (well, he might have when they first met, but he knows better now.)  but he knows he deserves it, knows it’s a miracle Sam even talks to him at all, much less forgives him, much less... much less has touched him in ways no angel should ever let a man touch him, ways Castiel isn’t sure he understands but that he likes a lot more than he should. All of this is wrong, and forgetting Christmas is surely the least of it.

But the hot chocolate is good, and Sam is close. Maybe that’s all that matters. Right now, it feels like it.

Sam moves, sits up, and a shamefully childish part of Castiel wants to scream at him not to go, not to go even an inch. He looks up, and Sam is already watching him. His hair is falling in his eyes, but Cas can see through it to warmth and softness and something a little like hunger that Cas has seen in Sam only once before.

And then Sam is kissing him, his lips warm and soft and his chocolate-peppermint flavored tongue fitting perfectly inside Cas’ mouth.

Cas knows he doesn’t really know how to kiss. Sam says he shouldn’t keep his eyes open, but he is always afraid to let Sam out of his sight in case Sam disappears, or turns into something evil, unlikely as that is.

But Sam hasn’t kissed him in weeks, so Castiel closes his eyes. And as soon as he does, Cas finds that his mouth knows what to do. Or, maybe it doesn’t, but at least all the tension about whether or not he’s doing it correctly melts away, and the entire world melts away, and all that’s left is Sam. It seems like it lasts a thousand years, this sensation of floating, this sensation of being grounded by Sam’s mouth, by Sam and the taste and touch and _feeling_ of Sam Winchester.

Castiel knows what a thousand years means. He knows jusy how much changes in a thousand years. When they pull apart, and Sam smiles gently, Cas knows exactly that much just did.

They go back to their hot chocolate. They’re even closer now, noses brushing against each other and foreheads and mouths so close it’s like they’re trying to get inside each other, but it doesn’t hurt. (It makes Castiel wonder what it would be like if Sam were his vessel. Probably not as special as this.) He covers Sam’s hand with his own, under the table. It isn’t cold anymore.


End file.
